BBtL Discussion: Slated for Off-season
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Every Sunday night, Eddie Andleman and the Sports Huddle made fun of the joke that was Billy Sullivan and the Patriots. Those were the days. I think of those days often and they make this run so much better.
When I was growing up, there was the occasional Cowboys fan, or an old school Giants fan left over from the days when they were the only team televised. But for the most part, we all loved the Pats, laughing stock that they were.
I enjoy the contributions of the non Patriots fans in this place, and considering where they are, I think they are treated pretty well over all. Forgive our gamethreading.
And Conig's contributions to the golf forum are fantastic, so I'm glad that particular Atlanta fan is here.
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mini-hi-jack
I used to listen to Eddie, Mark and Jim religiously, WBW, (even called a couple of times). They were irreverant and funny and there was nothing like them anywhere. And remember when they called Buckingham palace to find a guard for the Patriots.
As to other team fans posting here, I appreciate it, for the knowledge, different perspective, and reality check that 99% of the heathens bring to the party.
Observations about this thread, in order:
- I grew up 8 miles from Wawa, Pennsylvania. (Yes, it's a real place.) The store itself is not referred to as “the Wawa." It’s just Wawa. And it's awesome. If they offered haircuts, they would be awesome.
- If this is not clear, let me help you. Carson Wentz = "Wawa." Nick Foles = "the Wawa."
- Notwithstanding the change of heart shown by @singaporesoxfan , Philly accents suck. I am reminded of this every time I see my in-laws.
- For that matter, Philly fans (of all kinds) suck. I say that as a fan of all Philly sports teams.
- No one in Philadelphia or the surrounding area gets upset if you call it "Philly." We're too busy hangin' with Tony, eatin' hoagies, booin' our teams and throwin' snowballs at Santa.
- I'm a fan of Brady (my avatar should tell you why) and an admirer of Belichick, but have no particular love for the Patriots. With that said, OF COURSE the fan base is arrogant and entitled. Hell, the forum we're having this discussion in is entitled "Blinded by the Lombardis."
- You know what? They have a right. Their team is on the kind of roll that has never been seen before in the NFL and likely never will again.
- And yet they aren't even close to the insufferable Steelers fans from the 70s and 80s.
- Yankee fans and Pats fans are apples and oranges.
- Falcons fans appear to be delicate snowflakes. They would never cut it in a real sports town. (Like Philly, NY or Boston.)
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In 1985 and again in 1996, it was so utterly bizarre to have the Patriots going to the Super Bowl in a way that is impossible to recapture.
In New England in the 80s and, to a lesser extent, the 90s, you didn't really pay attention to other teams that weren't in lots of national games. So, sure, you know about your division rivals and the 49ers and Cowboys and a couple of other flash-for-a-couple-of-years teams, but the Pats weren't in many of those games so even to NE fans, the team felt like a B squad. There was no fantasy football, or Red Zone. So you really didn't know much about probably 80% of the league, All Pros aside. To have the Patriots get to a Super Bowl just felt so, so, strange. Like "Wow. So people around the country are going to be watching THE PATRIOTS?!"
It was very strange and wonderful, like Charlie setting foot inside the Factory...except when he gets kicked out, it's for real, and he has to go back to sharing a dilapidated flat with a bunch of old people.
In New England in the 80s and, to a lesser extent, the 90s, you didn't really pay attention to other teams that weren't in lots of national games. So, sure, you know about your division rivals and the 49ers and Cowboys and a couple of other flash-for-a-couple-of-years teams, but the Pats weren't in many of those games so even to NE fans, the team felt like a B squad. There was no fantasy football, or Red Zone. So you really didn't know much about probably 80% of the league, All Pros aside. To have the Patriots get to a Super Bowl just felt so, so, strange. Like "Wow. So people around the country are going to be watching THE PATRIOTS?!"
It was very strange and wonderful, like Charlie setting foot inside the Factory...except when he gets kicked out, it's for real, and he has to go back to sharing a dilapidated flat with a bunch of old people.
54, hear, hear! You nailed it! I can go back a bit further and add on the Pats getting slaughtered in the AFL title game in January 1964 by the Chargers. We were underdogs but didn’t expect that (51-10). Our biggest star in those years was Babe Parilli. Cappelletti, Buoniconti. Also, the fact of life nomadic home stadium history (BU Field, Harvard Stadium, Fenway Park and BC Alumni Stadium) before settling into the high tech (yeah, right) 7.1 million dollar Schaefer Stadium in 1971. Not even getting televised in New England (Giants) until the late 60s, except from Portland and/or Manchester, was it? Rabbit ears! Talk about going from the outhouse to the penthouse with Mr. Kraft, that’s us!
Back to this thread, it will make me think twice wrt content when posting about other teams and their fans. That’s a good thing, a value.
Back to this thread, it will make me think twice wrt content when posting about other teams and their fans. That’s a good thing, a value.
When I start next season's Falcons thread in BBTL, can I call it "The 2018 Falcons (and their Delicate Snowflake Fans)"?
For the record, the 28-3 references hardly bother me, except when used excessively in a way that the comedy falls completely flat. For one, *of course* this is a Patriots-oriented site - this is to be expected. For two, they often are quite funny. For three, as I've said before here, last season was the Falcons' best ever season for my money, even ahead of 1998-99 (which ended with a blowout loss and Eugene Robinson soliciting a prostitute), and I remember three-fourths of SB51 very fondly. Being up 28-3 is actually better than not being up 28-3, at least in my mind. Perhaps I was a little saltier than normal about 28-3 in my OP - although in my defense, the Falcons had just been knocked out of the playoffs in excruciating fashion. But really, I think you'll find that my OP was complaining more about the seemingly random hatred toward Atlanta and the Falcons, and indeed other random hatred toward any sports team, not the mostly good-natured or devilishly funny 28-3 stuff. Perhaps I shouldn't have couched that point in the context of comparing Pats fans and Yankees fans, as it seems to have been lost upon many (but by no means all) of the responders here.
Incidentally, Atlanta sports fans generally are pretty terrible. No way for me to put lipstick on that pig.
When you look at the Patriots over the first 41 years of the history of the franchise, to call Patriots fans Yankee fans is laughable, idiotic is more like it.
It's not like they won multiple AFL championships in the 60's, then had a similar run in the 80's and are now on another run; they were a tire fire for the most part, nomads for the first 11 years of their history, then settling into a shithole of a stadium with aluminum benches for seats and toilets that overflowed the first time they were test flushed. As you said, the Giants were rammed down our throats more often times than not (and gee, what memories watching Fran Tarkenton running for his life every Sunday) and it was a rare treat to see the Patriots on TV.
Yankee fans my ass.
I've written before about how other fans who call us arrogant can suck it but have to add that anyone equating Pats fans with Yankee fans must have just crawled out from under a rock. There are so many ways this is wrong but just let me point out one obvious one. Yes, I find the 28-3 memes amusing, and would probably not hesitate to bust a Falcons supporter balls by reminding them of it. But there is a very simple reason for this - it is because the team that you support lost a freaking 25 point lead to the team I support in the goddam Super Bowl. As painful as it is - it is a fact and Falcons supporters just have to suck it up and take it. I never begrudged a Mets fan the right to hold Game 6 over my head. I f-ing hated it - but every time my buddies who wore blue and orange referred to the Gateway Arch in St. Louis as "the Buckner's Legs monument" I grinned through it, tolerated it.
What I couldn't tolerate was when Yankee fans would bring up the same thing as if they had something to do with it. The Yankees were sitting home watching that game, on the way to finishing 4th, 5th, 5th and 7th over a span of years in which the Red Sox would win two more division championships and consistently challenge in the years they didn't win. But somehow Yankee fans felt entitled to bring up Buckner as if it had something to do with them. Their arrogance allowed them to simply adopt others misfortune as a trope for their own superiority. To put it in some context - a Yankee fan should have every right to shout "Bucky Dent" at me - but where the hell does going on about "1918" come from? Other than in very specific years - you didn't have shit to do with that.
There is no Patriots fan that is going to be engaging in that sort of nonsense, which is the real test of whether you have entered the realm of Yankee fan douchedom. It would be like playing the Colts and, instead of bringing up the fact that we've essentially waxed them on multiple occasions in the BB era we gave them shit about losing SB III to Namath and the Jets. When Pats fans call out other teams it tends to be, in the vast majority of instances, on things they own, that have been earned and that are directly relevant- not "mystique and aura" bullshit.
What I couldn't tolerate was when Yankee fans would bring up the same thing as if they had something to do with it. The Yankees were sitting home watching that game, on the way to finishing 4th, 5th, 5th and 7th over a span of years in which the Red Sox would win two more division championships and consistently challenge in the years they didn't win. But somehow Yankee fans felt entitled to bring up Buckner as if it had something to do with them. Their arrogance allowed them to simply adopt others misfortune as a trope for their own superiority. To put it in some context - a Yankee fan should have every right to shout "Bucky Dent" at me - but where the hell does going on about "1918" come from? Other than in very specific years - you didn't have shit to do with that.
There is no Patriots fan that is going to be engaging in that sort of nonsense, which is the real test of whether you have entered the realm of Yankee fan douchedom. It would be like playing the Colts and, instead of bringing up the fact that we've essentially waxed them on multiple occasions in the BB era we gave them shit about losing SB III to Namath and the Jets. When Pats fans call out other teams it tends to be, in the vast majority of instances, on things they own, that have been earned and that are directly relevant- not "mystique and aura" bullshit.
you're not the boss of me.
Winnah.
in keeping with the situation, I jovially congratulated Minny fans on feeling, for one night, the joy that Pats fans have been feeling the last 17 years. I was icily informed that Pats fans could never know that joy. We hadn't EARNED it, you see, cause we never had Blair Walsh or some happy horseshit like that.
btw, fuck minny too. I hope the vikings' bus gets lost in Jersey after the game suday and they all get sodomized.
I'm sorry....was that over the top?
At the moment of their triumph, passive-aggressively reminding them that their team has experienced only a smidgen of the success your team has?
You deserved more shit than you received. THAT is stereotypical Yankees fan behavior.
You deserved more shit than you received. THAT is stereotypical Yankees fan behavior.
This is an interesting discussion, esp as a discussion among Red Sox fans, like me, who not so long ago long luxuriated in the comfort of their status as Beautiful Losers.
I grant it that there is not value in trying to call out inane football trash talk (which by nature seems at a different and more personal level than such baseball bullshitting) but still. Isn't it bad form, at least, to pile, unprovoked, more shit on the hapless vanquished still wallowing in their own misery. You Pats fans are astride the mountain, legitimately smug for a generation or more to come, whatever happens. You have probably experienced more glorious football moments in the last 20 years, then any other franchise ever. You are insanely lucky fans. And on top of that, you cannot stand a criticism of taunting and belittling the pathetic Falcon fans? And why? Because of heartbreaks in the Mack Herron or Bledsoe era? Really, I think the dues for the pre-2001 years, including watching live NFL games on cold aluminum seats, have been more than reimbursed.
Trying to make a baseball analogy. When we took out the Indians in crushing fashion in 2007 ALCS, I could not have been happier. I did not like the Indians team or their fans and I had zero mixed emotions about it. Yet I cant imagine taunting a true Indians fans without some provocation after that series, knowing the real pain they must be experiencing. That's would just be dickish.
So sure root for the juggernaut unbeatable home town team to your hearts content to win it again. Go Bank America! No one would reasonably begrudge you that. But, after winning, a little appreciation for the heartbreak of the less fortunate would seem in order.
I grant it that there is not value in trying to call out inane football trash talk (which by nature seems at a different and more personal level than such baseball bullshitting) but still. Isn't it bad form, at least, to pile, unprovoked, more shit on the hapless vanquished still wallowing in their own misery. You Pats fans are astride the mountain, legitimately smug for a generation or more to come, whatever happens. You have probably experienced more glorious football moments in the last 20 years, then any other franchise ever. You are insanely lucky fans. And on top of that, you cannot stand a criticism of taunting and belittling the pathetic Falcon fans? And why? Because of heartbreaks in the Mack Herron or Bledsoe era? Really, I think the dues for the pre-2001 years, including watching live NFL games on cold aluminum seats, have been more than reimbursed.
Trying to make a baseball analogy. When we took out the Indians in crushing fashion in 2007 ALCS, I could not have been happier. I did not like the Indians team or their fans and I had zero mixed emotions about it. Yet I cant imagine taunting a true Indians fans without some provocation after that series, knowing the real pain they must be experiencing. That's would just be dickish.
So sure root for the juggernaut unbeatable home town team to your hearts content to win it again. Go Bank America! No one would reasonably begrudge you that. But, after winning, a little appreciation for the heartbreak of the less fortunate would seem in order.
I previously glossed over this post, but I think it's very much worth revisiting. There are at least 27 or 28 NFL teams for which this is still very much true, I think: even with the RedZone Channel and NFL Game Pass and Fantasy Football, there's something quite unbelievable about your favorite sports team being in arguably the most famous single sporting contest IN THE WORLD, particularly if this is its first or second or even third time reaching it. I think some younger Pats fans to whom everything is coming so easy (for now) should talk to their elders and try to better understand just how unreal their team's current run is. And even some older Pats fans could try a little bit harder to remember that the Pats have made more consecutive AFC Championship Games in their current run than some teams have made the NFL *Playoffs* in the Super Bowl era and react with empathy, remembering life as a Patriots fan before 2001-02 and how losing to Green Bay in the Super Bowl was actually how your team's best season by far (for quite a while) came to an end.
I completely expect to get made fun of for what I'm about to say now...but this quote makes me feel, I don't know, icky. Not the post itself or the poster himself as such, but the whole ball-busting culture that is being cited here. "I would probably not hesitate to bust a Falcons supporter's balls." "Falcons supporters just have to suck up and take it." "I never begrudged a Mets fan the right to hold Game 6 over my head." If we weren't talking about sports, wouldn't this sort of dynamic in a relationship between friends strike you as completely odd? There are many Sox fans for whom Game 6 in 1986 was as painful as the death of a relative, if not more so. Would you ever in a million years tease a friend on account of his screw-up brother dying from an overdose or something? Of course you wouldn't. Or to put it in more tribal terms, if one of your Trump-supporting friends started teasing you about snowflake liberals and fake news and Mueller being a crook, would you feel as though you "just had to suck it up and take it" because Trump won an election? I highly doubt it. And yet, we not only allow this dynamic to exist in our sports fan lives, many of us positively encourage it and welcome it. There's nothing your Mets fan friend did to deserve the right to gloat over you for 1986 - all he did was choose to support a different color of laundry than you at a certain point in his life. A lottery winner might as well gloat over all non-lottery winners for being inferior and unlucky.
In saying this, I'm not trying to diminish the importance of sports in any way or to suggest that being a passionate fan is somehow wrong. But if I had any close friends who were Saints fans, my response to the Vikings win on Sunday would have been to feel sorry for them and empathize with them. Even if as a Falcons fan I rather dislike the Saints in the abstract (and Sean Payton somewhat less abstractly), and I will laugh at Marcus Williams memes for quite some time, I wouldn't ever let that sporting malice get in the way of an actual, real-life, person-to-person relationship. Why would I want to make a friend or colleague feel bad? Why would I want to be friends with someone who wanted to make me feel bad? Even if these things always evened out, and 50% of the time fans of Team A got to make fun of Team B and 50% of the time it was the other way around, is it healthy to have a relationship defined (even in part) by mutual mockery? I suppose I could buy that for women and (particularly) men who are unable to suppress their tribal instincts, releasing them in sports-related ball-busting is certainly better than getting involved in religious or racial tribalism, etc. But sometimes you just have to be a human being, don't you? To cite @DanoooME, there's a difference between making fun of the Steelers in a Patriots thread and making fun of the Steelers in the Steelers-specific thread. And there's a difference between me passively enjoying a bit of Saints-related schadenfreude and the guy on the Falcons SBNation site who was bragging about how he went to the Saints SBNation site and started trolling Saints fans for kicks. Should those Saints fans have "taken it"? No - that idiot got kicked off the Saints site, and rightly so.
And hey, if you and your friends dig the mutual ball-busting thing, knock yourselves out - you're consenting adults and can do what you want. But I don't think you should presume to force those standards onto other sports fan friends and acquaintances. And while this a hometown site for Boston fans first and foremost, to the point that fans of other teams should know what they're getting into and expect a bit of (hopefully good-natured) ball-busting from time to time, a little bit of empathy and understanding really does go a long way with those of us who came here for the Red Sox and stayed for the intelligent craic even though our sporting identities do not always revolve around each and every one of the Boston-area teams.
As far as I can recollect, you were personally treated rather well in the immediate aftermath of the previous SB. I don't recall anyone kicking you when you were down, or anything of that ilk. That said, once the body was cold, there are more jokes that occur, because in theory it is less painful the further we get from it - hence the "too soon?" jokes. As you yourself have mentioned, the 28-3 memes and the like came from mainstream directions - not limited or exclusive to Patriot fans.
You are espousing a real soft, delicate way to approach sports. And in some locations, or contexts that might be fine. When visiting the in-laws who are fans of the other team, being gracious is clearly a requirement. Being obnoxious in general, who needs it. But you keep walking past the fact that this is a community of RedSox fans who are also avid fans of other Boston sports. I didn't use the community word lightly. There has been a long evolution in decorum in this community, but in many ways this as tight a knit community as I've seen based on the internet. The foundations of this site were covered with "your mom" jokes and all manner of ball busting - even within team boundaries. Ball busting is in the DNA of this site. There have been countless get togethers on this site where people do more than treat each other as digital personas. People on this site have gotten together as a group for Sox games (the pre-game softball game, and the bar pre-game as well). This has happened in multiple cities. They've busted balls over whether or not a member could hit a 90 mph fastball. They've gotten drunk together and unfortunately also thrown up on each other. They've attended Bruins games, they've shared tickets to various events. They've hosted each other in their homes. They've helped each other lose weight, fight depression, and fix plumbing. They've raised countless amounts of money for various charities. They've supported members who have lost family members (including children), who've gone through divorces, who've had to euthanize pets. We've supported members who were serving their country in the military. They've acted like assholes to each other as well. These are things that happen in a community, and there are always ebbs and flows. And the site has evolved in its handling and acceptance of various societal topics and manners and seems to be poised to continue to do so.
In that context, to me any amount of (good natured) ball busting within the community seems fair game - and if it gets heavy, there are mods who will put the brakes on it. My personal choices in the tenor of my posts in non-Pats threads are going to be different than others. But if I'm being honest here you seem to be trying to push hard for a kinder, gentler, fandom - and I'm not sure that it needs to be tempered much. My biggest complaints are the obvious trolling, the piling on that occurs at times, and those that bring a non-sports agenda into every single thread, whether it is societal, political, xyz-gate related or what have you. But you grin and bear it and if you don't like it, you pass on that thread. I don't know why it needs to be more complicated than that.
Edit: tl;dr - this community has it's history of ball busting within what is a surprisingly tight knit group - no one is being forced to participate. And yes the assumption is that it's all good natured fun among adults. If someone goes over the line, the dopes are on it.
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One of the best posts in this site’s long history was made by Maalox, who sternly admonished someone for being “so earnest”.
It applies here.
It applies here.
Just a reminder that 28-3 now serves a dual purpose, especially for those who talk good-natured shit with Buffalo natives in their office, as it’s Tom Brady’s career record versus the Bills.
(Though really, it should be 28-2 as one game didn’t mean anything to the Pats, but it is what it is.)
Even one of Atlanta's radio talk show hosts-John Kincaid says it's not a great sports town. But he is from the Philly area originally and much of the time he praises Philly and their rabid fans.
It's really not though.
The OP was talking about a game thread. The mods and most posters are respectful of threads dedicated to a particular team - scroll through the Stelers thread or the Dolphins one and most people are respectful of the fans posting there; when they aren't they are called out on it. People didn't go into a Falcons thread and start talking shit.
Game threads are designed for dumb, caveman, stream of consciousness rambling. That's why they exist. Taking anything from those is by definition being oversensitive. As stated by many, everyone here was very respectful of CP after the game. To start a thread complaining about posts in a game thread and claiming some kind of bias or deep seeded hatred is quite frankly comical. If people had gone into the Seahawks thread after the Super Bowl and started baiting taunting Danomee, he'd have a bitch and it'd be legit. When people have made comments in the Steelers or Dolphins threads, they've been told, to stop.
Pulling two random messages out of a game thread isn't a basis for raising this discussion, because it's the equivalent of criticizing some random drunk guy at a game yelling the other QB sucks and dating the whole fanbase for it.
Completely agreed - you guys were great. I'd like to think I earned that therapy to some extent by being a good non-Pats fan; if I had been obnoxious before the Super Bowl or less gracious after it, I wouldn't have expected such kindness...which in a way goes to the heart of my argument. But the fact still stands.
If two comments in a game thread had been the extent of my observation of this phenomenon, I never would have started this thread. I was lazy for citing only those two comments, but that doesn't mean I was wrong - it means I was lazy. I also started this thread to raise a question about fan behavior more generally, beyond SoSH; SoSH happens to possess some of the best fans in all of sports (in my opinion), but when lousy behavior from the wider world leaks into SoSH, I don't think it's unfair to highlight a relatively rare phenomenon within SoSH as a way of opening a discussion about the wider world.
This is a great post. My gentle counter would be to ask what happened to male culture along the evolution of humanity that made ball-busting an integral part of all of this. Why can't we have all the great stuff highlighted in bold without feeling the need to piss on each other from time to time? If an alien from another planet came to earth and observed the male psyche in action, among SoSHers and otherwise, I'm sure it would find this behavior curious. But anyway...
...this is fair, and I'll shut up now.
John Hannah, Mack Herron, Andy Johnson, Russ Francis, Steve Nelson, Daryl Stingley, Leon Gray, the list goes on and on, not that the other guys are equal to Mr. Hannah.
And yes, to the deepest level of Hell, Ben Dreith.
I think the most cogent posts thus far is that this would have been far more interesting and appropriate as an off-season thread.
As it is now, it is kinda a text book example of privileging a set of interests over the collective experience of a huge number of fans, which seems kinda a lack of consideration, if not smacking of an element of self-absorption.
Let people have their day. I mean, I remember the first time I was about to razz someone over a loss... and realized that was kinda a dick thing to do. By the same token, if that same fan had cut into me over the win on my end and griped about it, all bets would have been off as he broke the seal.
Timing matters, and as much as i respect the opinions and orientation of the opening poster, this was not the time or place for bursting the bubble of refuge people take in enjoying sport. I mean, we know it’s dumb.
I think most here know I try to be a pretty reflective guy, even if I often fail. But there’s a time to let people enjoy a thing, even a silly thing, and then reflect later on the great truths of the darkness of men’s souls.
If we can’t get some enjoyment out of this vale of tears and toil, than what does recognition of these great truths serve for us?
As it is now, it is kinda a text book example of privileging a set of interests over the collective experience of a huge number of fans, which seems kinda a lack of consideration, if not smacking of an element of self-absorption.
Let people have their day. I mean, I remember the first time I was about to razz someone over a loss... and realized that was kinda a dick thing to do. By the same token, if that same fan had cut into me over the win on my end and griped about it, all bets would have been off as he broke the seal.
Timing matters, and as much as i respect the opinions and orientation of the opening poster, this was not the time or place for bursting the bubble of refuge people take in enjoying sport. I mean, we know it’s dumb.
I think most here know I try to be a pretty reflective guy, even if I often fail. But there’s a time to let people enjoy a thing, even a silly thing, and then reflect later on the great truths of the darkness of men’s souls.
If we can’t get some enjoyment out of this vale of tears and toil, than what does recognition of these great truths serve for us?
I may not be reading this correctly, so let me know if so.
To me, the collective experience--especially for Pats fans--is not lessened much by encouraging certain comments away from team-specific threads.
The enjoyment of a win, the memes, jokes, schadenfreude, are all opened to be had in dozens of "regular" threads where they are already being shared and welcomed. (Now, if BBtL gets to a point where a "28-3" joke is modded out because of an Atlanta fan scrolling through a Pats-centric thread, that certainly would be a disservice to everyone.)
Take the Pittsburgh loss, for example. Yes, we have a Steelers thread but I feel a selective few comments could have been posted in the Divisional Round game thread and wouldn't be any less enjoyable. In fact, the Game Ball/PoW threads were started specifically to vent and/or celebrate in a "game thread" style without having them spill over to other threads, as part of the attempt to increase the overall "signal/noise".
Now some of you may remember that I used to be quite active in the Jets thread. Having lived in NY/NJ area for about a dozen years, it was almost cathartic to relish in many failures of that franchise (perhaps I shouldn't have worn my Pats hat so stubbornly everywhere).
If I were told put a brake on it by a mod, I certainly would have balked and lost a lot of enthusiasm for this board. However, looking back I think I was stuck too much in that mode and contributed quite a bit to the noise, rather signal. (I guess that's why the only one I remember from all the thousands I've posted was the one about the validity of signing Ivory, which actually had some researching and charting into it).
So for now, I'm in favor of treating the team-specific threads more like the Yankees sub-forum, in an effort to encourage more participation from non-NEP posters, realizing that it may go against legit & fair concerns and pushbacks from many NEP posters.
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Yup.
CP, it's fucking sports. Equating a loss to the death of a loved one is...Well, out of touch. Busting balls about sports is trolling before trolling was a thing. My friends who are Giants fans were relentless after The Scottish Game. The owner of my favorite bar in college was a Yankees fan, where I was after the 2003 Boone homerun. How do you think that went?
If everyone was super supportive of everyone's team, why play the damn game? Loosen up.
This is going to be pretty silly but here it goes.
This is a Pats bar. Everyone is having a good time after a big game and relishing in a Steelers loss. On a corner, there's a table with a few Steelers fans. You're already surrounded by other Pats fans. You can go over to the Steelers table, pull up a chair, and start to talk about how bad of a decision not to have Big Ben sneak on a 4-and-1 or how Tomlin is a terrible coach and should be fired. That's all fine and dandy because it's a bar and sports is just sports. And it's on the Steelers fans if they get sensitive about that and leave the bar. But if another Pats fan pulled up a chair and start to troll the Steeler fans that made them never come back to the bar, the place as a whole became worse, not better.
I'm already thinking of Nancy Reagan's brains/eggs/drugs ad so I should stop.
We're not really talking about the same thing.
Yes, I agree people should let the other fans have their threads/safe spaces.
I also think if they walk into a Patriots game thread and see someone say "Fuck the Falcons", they don't need to start a weird diatribe about how a good chunk of patriots fans are ignorant assholes and try to diagnose why they are such assholes, while trying to get Patriots fans to agree that they're assholes.
I am a huge believer in the team threads and encouraging that kind of engagement—I’ll have more to say about that later.
This isn’t one of those team specific threads, though. This is about hashing the issue out in the main sub forum.
I think it’s a good conversation, just that it’s not the time or the place.
How many parents tell their kids about Santa Clause in December?
Things worth doing are worth doing well, which means doing properly. I think the supportive nature here is amazing—but that doesn’t mean this is rightly done.
I'm with Rev here--I initially thought this was worth engaging, but given timing and the approach taken I think it's a distraction and better addressed under a different title, and in the offseason where there can be some reflection and thoughtful assessment of what's real, what's worth changing, and what's personal preference.
Agreed - *my* team's season was over when I started this thread, but the Patriots' obviously isn't. So the timing is indeed suboptimal.
OP's support does it. Let's revisit this at a later date.
Edit: Updated thread title accordingly. BIG THANK YOU to everyone.
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